Keep Fighting!

Christianity is war, plain and simple.  If you are a Christian and don’t know this—you are in trouble.

This war is far more real than you think.  The fighting--more intense.  Real victories are hard won and more rare than you think. Casualties abound, retreat is commonplace, and taking and holding ground far more costly than ever imagined.  This war is the ultimate reality all earthly wars point to.  They are but a picture of this war as real and horrific as they are. 

In this fight, our weapons are not made of metal and plastic but are divinely powerful designed to destroy all that is in us that is opposed to Christ.  Our enemy is a brutal, savvy, treacherous, highly skilled, and unbelievably enduring foe whose greatest strength is his close proximity to us....for our enemy is always with us 24/7.  It is none other than our sinful flesh, our old man, if you will, whose nature it is to oppose, fight, and if it could, destroy the spiritual life within us that is becoming more and more glorious everyday as it is being conformed moment-by-moment into the image of Christ 24/7 whether you realize it or not.

Our enemy will never quit, be reformed, tamed, surrender, tire of fighting, or concede.  It will fight us to the death and only in our death will its head never rise again.  But while our flesh presents itself as such a formidable foe it can be defeated even if not yet destroyed.  It can be resisted and it can even be used to encourage our battle hardened and weary souls when seen correctly for what it is and why it is.  You see, the mere realization that we have a sinful flesh that opposes us in our desire to pursue Christ assures us that our pursuit of Christ is real and something the enemy of our soul finds worthy of opposing. 

The truth all Christians must grasp and hold onto for dear life is that the mere fact that we are being opposed by and opposing our sinful flesh provides us with an assurance of salvation we could find nowhere else.  For you see before salvation, we were at peace with our sin but at war with God. Because of salvation, we are now at peace with God but at war with our sin. 

Listen, I know firsthand how ugly this battle can get.  I also understand how demoralizing and discouraging it often becomes to lose battle after battle.  But don’t diminish the value of the battle whether won or lost.  Only believers are at war with their sinful flesh and thus, the greatest value may not lie so much in your success as much as in the fact that you’re in the fight. 

So, just keep fighting!   

The Gospel Is The Main Thing

There is an idea floating around some churches that gospel preaching or preaching the gospel is not necessary for believers, who need more meatier portions of Scripture taught so as to result in a deeper understanding of God and of course greater sanctification.  The only problem with this idea is that it is not grounded in Scripture and thus it is wrong.  More than that, the idea that believers will be bored with hearing the gospel and the ramifications of the gospel preached and taught on a consistent basis is due more to the shallowness of how the gospel is often preached and the immaturity of believers rather than any fault in the gospel.

As I read my Bible I see rather plainly that the gospel of God's free and sovereign grace is not just the  way we enter the Kingdom; it is also the means by which we grow into the very likeness of the King of this Kingdom.  Take Titus 2:11-13 for instance, which states clearly that it is the gospel alone that leads believers to sanctified living:

For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men.  It teaches us to say "No" to ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in this present age, while we wait for the blessed hope--the glorious appearing of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ.

Notice, that Paul confidently and unapologetically makes the point that the way we as believers learn how to successfully say no to their sinful flesh so as to live self-controlled and godly lives is by letting the gospel teach us.  The idea is that as we are trained, coached, and disciplined, over time, by the gospel we will begin to change from the inside out.

And if, as Peter writes in 1 Peter 1:2 that the angels never tire of gazing at and exploring the wonders of the gospel as presented in the Word of God and experienced in the lives of repentant sinners, how can we find it boring, simplistic, or unnecessary?  The fact is, because the gospel of God's free and sovereign grace is so amazingly and endlessly rich, it can handle, as Tim Keller writes, "the burden of being the one main thing of a church".